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BBC News reports that the Shenzhou 11 spacecraft with two taikonauts has successfully docked with China's second space station (their first station, Tiangong-1, was also recently in the news, because it is dropping from orbit).
The Shenzhou-11 spacecraft blasted off from northern China on Monday, and docked with Tiangong 2 at 03:24 Beijing time (19:24 GMT Tuesday).
Jing Haipeng and Chen Dong will be spending the next 30 days in space conducting experiments.
It marks the longest space mission by Chinese astronauts.
The docking took place 393km (244 miles) above Earth and the remotely controlled procedure lasted about two hours, according to state media.
The docking took place in the early hours of Wednesday morning Beijing time.
State television on Wednesday morning carried live video of the docking and arrival of the astronauts, or "taikonauts", which saw them floating through a narrow 1m-long, 80cm-wide passageway into the lab.
The pair "extended greetings to all the people of the nation," while onboard the laboratory, according to the Xinhua news agency.
More links:
http://www.ecns.cn/2016/10-19/230722.shtml
I'm curious why they have only 2 crew this time instead of 3. Maybe they needed the extra space for the food experiments?
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 19 2016, @10:26PM
And then 20 years later when the shoe is on the other foot and it's your economy in the shitter
It's hard to argue that the US economy is substantially worse than it was 20 years ago. I'll agree that one could argue it is worse (a hard argument, given the number of computers, cell phones, large TVs, and other items have increased over the years), but do you really think it is substantially worse?
Source [multpl.com]. I'm sure there are more.
and you can't even afford a manned space program anymore,
There is a difference between not being able to afford it, and deciding it is not a wise choice. I could just as easily point to your not owning a garden gnome [wikipedia.org] as proof that you are poor. "He/she can't even afford a garden gnome, how pathetic."
You can disagree with the decision, but do you really think that the US couldn't afford a space program right now. If 90% of the population demanded it, I'm sure that 5% of the US government budget (let alone the GDP) would easily be able to fund all demands for a space program.
you have to beg rides off the Russians who are nice enough to let you go
If by "beg" you mean pay lots of money [foxnews.com]. Don't try to portray this as the charity of the Russians letting the hapless Americans bum a ride. This is an economic transaction, pure and simple.
At best you can spin this to a "US and Russia don't distrust/hate each other's guts."
even when your politicians won't shut up about how evil Russia is.
This is true... but it also masks the fact that both Russia and the US are large and diverse places. How many Americans hate the US government? I assume Russia has just as much diversity.
Also, how much hatred would you need to have to turn down a ~$70m sale?